


Stopping for Coffee

by Leonawriter



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's
Genre: F/M, Post-Canon, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-04
Updated: 2013-11-04
Packaged: 2017-12-31 10:41:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1030730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leonawriter/pseuds/Leonawriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It had started with coffee, but not in quite the same way that he thought that most relationships did.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stopping for Coffee

It started with coffee.

He supposed that quite a few stories started like that, but he also assumed that usually they also began with one party inviting the other around _for_ coffee, not... one of them serving the other and hoping that they'd be even _noticed_.

Not that either of them minded, really, even if he did sometimes feel ashamed of himself for how he used to act.

Still.  It had started with coffee.  Coffee, at least once a week and maybe more depending on circumstances.

Then, there had been the tournaments, and he'd had less and less time for anyone, least of all a romantic entanglement that would only distract him from his training.

Except, there had still been coffee, and by now he'd started to notice that it came just as he needed it- a little extra sugar, a little extra milk, a bit less of either.

He'd say 'thank you'.  The first time, he didn't remember saying it, but she later told him, and he realised that he must have.  

Then, gradually, other things began to creep in.

"How was your day?" she'd ask (she later told him how much guts it took, when he looked tired, and she thought he'd snap at her.  He didn't, and it gave her courage).

"I nearly beat him again,"  he said back one day (she knew what he meant by now, that he'd tried to duel Yuusei again, and almost, almost made it, but he didn't give up, and that was _his_ courage, and she liked that about him).

"I'm sure you'll do it some day!" she said perkily, an attempt to reassure him  (she'd turned quickly away thinking that he'd take offense, and was nervous, expecting either to be misunderstood, or worse, ignored.)

"Hn."

Another day, it became him looking idly through the paper, eyes constantly drawn back to a mid-page article.

"Ah..."

He'd looked up, and there she was, holding out his coffee.  He let her set it down, and then, for some reason, found himself asking what the matter was.

She'd shaken her head, but caved easily, noting simply that she hadn't seen the reporter girl with the glasses for a while.

Jack showed her the article - one by Carly, not front page but not too bad for a reporter that, as far as he could remember, kept being threatened with being fired.  It was all about how she'd made a trip to Satisfaction Town as it was now called, and compiled a report of some kind on everything that had happened in the area with just talking to people, although Jack had seen a few quotes from what he, Yuusei and Crow had told her of the incident as well.

The words on the paper didn't tell the whole story, though.  They didn't tell of how he'd had emails and calls asking how he was doing, and wanting to know if everything was all right on his end, because wasn't it a shame that she'd still be in Satisfaction Town while he was over in Neo Domino for a stopover again...

He remembered a time when that wouldn't have mattered.  She'd have just come running, packed her bags, and run.

He'd let her go, though, he realised. 

"It looks like she's doing well, though, right?"

"Mn," he said, taking a sip of heaven. "She's negotiating whether ot accept a job offer over there."

That she'd even felt the need to ask told him that she should, since if they _wanted_ her, then she should go.  Although he had a funny idea it had to do with something else, as well.

"Oh!  That's good then, isn't it?"

"It'd make her happy."

That's what he thought, anyway, and not just because of the job.

"Good..." He was caught by the way she trailed off, and yet he hid his expression by taking another sip.  For some reason, it didn't taste as good this time.  "Ah..."  She couldn't seem to get her words out any more.

Not that it mattered.  She was just there to wait tables, right?  Any moment now, she'd be going back to work, picking cups and glasses off of the tables, wiping them down...

He focused on the coffee for several more minutes, although the taste, while just as good as normal, didn't get any better.

"B-but... Jack?" He'd thought she would have been gone, but she wasn't.  "Are... are _you_ happy?"

He'd put down the now-empty cup, confused.  She was standing there, head bowed as though he were revered (later, she told him it was just because she was trying to hide her blush).

He'd stared at her, not sure how to respond- he both was and wans't happy, he was happy for Carly but all confused inside, because Carly being happy meant that she wasn't with him, she was somewhere else maybe with _someone_ else, he'd caused this and he was working so hard on his dueling that so often, he didn't have the time for even the things he'd used to do.

In some ways, he was happy.  In others... in others, though, how could he be?

She ran away as he tried to think of an answer, and the next time they saw each other was months later, at a tournament.

"My shop is helping sponsor the Grand Prix!" she said, forgetting to be nervous amid all the excitement and noise.

Carly had accepted the job offer, but she'd said she'd be there at his next tournament, if she could make it.  She had, he'd seen her, although he wasn't sure if she and Kiryu were together, or had simply come at the same time.  Either way, he'd be stopping by to talk whenever he had the time.

"You're looking good," he'd found himself saying, and then later, when he had the time, paused, and wondered when he'd been able to tell when she wasn't.

He found Kiryu, still wearing that long black coat and using a gun-themed duel disk, but his hair was cut short and he told Jack that he and Carly had come by D-Wheel, something that had both interested him and caught his attention - when was the last time either of them had driven a D-Wheel?  It must have been.... oh, back, way back, during 'that' time, but he found himself unable to tell for sure.

He told them both that at some point, he'd want a riding duel out of them both, to which Carly had been unsure, but he wouldn't hear any of it.  

"A friendly match," he'd said.  "For old times."

The good times, he meant, and they knew what he'd intended.

Later, he'd be sitting at his old spot, and he heard her come up (he didn't even look up, just heard her footsteps and knew, somehow, that it was her), and asked-

"Have you ever duelled, Stephanie?"

He'd caught her off guard again, and had to reach out to steady his coffee.

"I- I- um... n-not really..."

He wondered what kind of deck she'd run if she did.

"I mean... I guess I've got a couple of cards, but... they're not what I'd play with, I- they're just ones that people gave to me..."

He'd asked to see them, and didn't expect to be called away so suddenly.  

He also didn't expect her to have remembered, and kept them around with her ever since, until the next time they met weeks later.

To a professional, they weren't much.  But he still remembered searching for hours to find even _one_ card, going out into Satellite day after day and treating it like a game, because the alternative was to hate the City for their lot in life.  With that in mind, and the fact that she'd not just given them away but _kept_ them, they had just as much value as almost anything he could name.

She'd told him a bit about her family, and her friends, and he'd listened, and when her boss called her away he asked on a sudden whim if he could borrow them.

"As long as you give them back," she'd said, and he'd promised (she'd later admit that she wouldn't have minded if he hadn't, because then they'd be in the hands of a real duelist, but he'd tell her that even when not played, the cards still meant something).

He wondered whether she was watching when he won a match using her cards.  (She was, and she screamed when she saw, never having thought that he might do such a thing).

And then, one day, he'd come around later than usual, and found her as she was leaving.

"Where are you going?"

"Home?  I mean, I've come out of work, so..."

"...Do you want to have coffee?"

(She'd had more than enough coffee already, but she'd said yes, because coffee with Jack was much better than coffee in and in between breaks, and he treated her to something good, too.)

It was funny, he thought, how usually the story started with one of them taking the other out for coffee.

With theirs, he wasn't sure if you'd call that the beginning, or the end.

The end of seeing her as just his waitress... or the beginning of something more.

...

AN: Okay I ship this?  And at first it was going to be really short.  But apparently the fic - Jack, I'm looking at you - had other ideas...  Kiryu/Carly found its way in because hey, I ship that too, and otherwise I generally tend to revert to Scoopshipping.


End file.
